Search Google Appliance

Work

The tools, rules, and relationships of the workplace illustrate some of the enduring collaborations and conflicts in the everyday life of the nation. The Museum has more than 5,000 traditional American tools, chests, and simple machines for working wood, stone, metal, and leather. Materials on welding, riveting, and iron and steel construction tell a more industrial version of the story. Computers, industrial robots, and other artifacts represent work in the Information Age.

But work is more than just tools. The collections include a factory gate, the motion-study photographs of Frank and Lillian Gilbreth, and more than 3,000 work incentive posters. The rise of the factory system is measured, in part, by time clocks in the collections. More than 9,000 items bring in the story of labor unions, strikes, and demonstrations over trade and economic issues.

This large sperm whale tooth is 7-1/2 inches high. On the main side is a portrait bust of a middle-aged man from the left side. He is well dressed with vest, tie and jacket, but unshaven and growing out a beard. His hair is thin on top and he has a comb over. Although he is not identified, the unusual size of the tooth and high quality of the engraving indicates that he was an important individual.

The reverse of the tooth has a woman on a rearing horse on a rocky landscape; she holds the reins in her left hand and is waving on high a flag on a short pole in her right hand. A helmeted male figure with a staff, bow and small shield is holding a section of her garment, but it is not clear whether he is helping her with a frisky horse or trying to pull her off it. This is probably some sort of theatrical, allegorical or mythical scene (Apollo chasing Daphne?), but its meaning and any relationship to the figure on the other side are not clear.

Scrimshaw began in the late 18th or early 19th century as the art of carving whale bone and ivory aboard whale ships. The crew on whalers had plenty of leisure time between sighting and chasing whales, and the hard parts of whales were readily available on voyages that could last up to four years.

In its simplest form, a tooth was removed from the lower jaw of a sperm whale and the surface was prepared by scraping and sanding until it was smooth. The easiest way to begin an etching was to smooth a print over the tooth, prick the outline of the image with a needle and then “connect-the-dots” once the paper was removed. This allowed even unskilled craftsmen to create fine carvings. Some sailors were skilled enough to etch their drawings freehand. After the lines were finished, they were filled in with lamp black or sometimes colored pigments.

Scrimshaw could be decorative, like simple sperm whale teeth, or they could be useful, as in ivory napkin rings, corset busks (stiffeners), swifts for winding yarn or pie crimpers. The sailor’s hand-carved scrimshaw was then given to loved ones back on shore as souvenirs of the hard and lonely life aboard long and dangerous voyages.

A 20-gun American sailing warship covers the upper portion of one side of this intricately detailed scrimshaw sperm whale tooth. Nearly every sail is set; flags are flying; and every gun port is open with its gun out and ready for action. Unusually, the flying flags and pennants are polychrome, with red stripes.

Below are two smaller ships in their own etched checkerboard frames, sailing towards each other on a collision course. Normally these would represent different views of the larger ship above, but both of these sailing ships are merchant vessels, without any guns. The vessel on the right is spewing smoke out of a midship smoke stack, and may be either an auxiliary steamer or a whaleship trying out a whale. In trying out, a whale’s outer layer of body fat or “blubber” was cut into small pieces and tossed into a hot cauldron to render it down into liquid.

The other side of the tooth is carved with a hillside town, with several levels of buildings dominated by a large cathedral with a tall steeple reaching up into the sky. The steeple also has red accents. On the lowest level along the waterfront are two arches; a “D” is carved into one, and a shallow “S” was carved into the other. However, the “S” was scratched out and not in-filled with black pigment to make it stand out, like the rest of the tooth’s carving. Below in the harbor are two small but detailed sailing ships without sails, probably at anchor. The one on the right has a smoking stack similar to the vessel on the other side of the tooth, but much of that ship is gone because the base of the tooth is broken and missing.

Although the style of the carving on this tooth is relatively simple, it was made by an experienced schrimshander, as shown by the amount of detail, the depth of the etching and the infilling.

Scrimshaw began in the late 18th or early 19th century as the art of carving whale bone and ivory aboard whale ships. The crew on whalers had plenty of leisure time between sighting and chasing whales, and the hard parts of whales were readily available on voyages that could last up to four years.

In its simplest form, a tooth was removed from the lower jaw of a sperm whale and the surface was prepared by scraping and sanding until it was smooth. The easiest way to begin an etching was to smooth a print over the tooth, prick the outline of the image with a needle and then “connect-the-dots” once the paper was removed. This allowed even unskilled craftsmen to create fine carvings. Some sailors were skilled enough to etch their drawings freehand. After the lines were finished, they were filled in with lamp black or sometimes colored pigments.

Scrimshaw could be decorative, like simple sperm whale teeth, or they could be useful, as in ivory napkin rings, corset busks (stiffeners), swifts for winding yarn or pie crimpers. The sailor’s hand-carved scrimshaw was then given to loved ones back on shore as souvenirs of the hard and lonely life aboard long and dangerous voyages.

The obverse, or main side of this tooth is dominated by an etching of an American merchant sailing ship under sail from right to left. Below the water is an exergue or separate scene of three women. In the center is the bust of a woman in an arch; the two outside women are holding up flowers in one hand and pointing at the woman in the center with the other hand, as if they were on stage congratulating her after a performance.

On the reverse is a patriotic scene of a woman standing in front of an anchor. In her right hand she holds a flagpole topped with a 19-star American flag; her left forefinger is held up, apparently to indicate “#1.” To her left is a house with a smoking chimney; on her right are a flowering plant, a palm tree and a steeple.

The American flags, the flowers and other details are highlighted in red for a polychrome effect. With the women, ship and patriotic symbolism, the scrimshaw artist of this piece has managed to include all of the common sailor’s favorite themes.

Scrimshaw began in the late 18th or early 19th century as the art of carving whale bone and ivory aboard whale ships. The crew on whalers had plenty of leisure time between sighting and chasing whales, and the hard parts of whales were readily available on voyages that could last up to four years.

In its simplest form, a tooth was removed from the lower jaw of a sperm whale and the surface was prepared by scraping and sanding until it was smooth. The easiest way to begin an etching was to smooth a print over the tooth, prick the outline of the image with a needle and then “connect-the-dots” once the paper was removed. This allowed even unskilled craftsmen to create fine carvings. Some sailors were skilled enough to etch their drawings freehand. After the lines were finished, they were filled in with lamp black or sometimes colored pigments.

Scrimshaw could be decorative, like simple sperm whale teeth, or they could be useful, as in ivory napkin rings, corset busks (stiffeners), swifts for winding yarn or pie crimpers. The sailor’s hand-carved scrimshaw was then given to loved ones back on shore as souvenirs of the hard and lonely life aboard long and dangerous voyages.

The engraving on this sperm whale tooth depicts a well-dressed young boy seated on a rock, with a red horn in his hands. He wears a brimmed hat, long jacket and knee-length breeches. By contrast, his feet are bare. The scene is framed by a simple quasi-vegetal repetitive motif. The frequent pinpricking around the edges and at key points throughout the image indicates that the artist used a contemporary illustration to create an outline before filling it in with pigment. In addition to the horn, the lapels and lower hem of the lad’s jacket are highlighted in red, now faded with age. The other side of the tooth is polished but undecorated.

Scrimshaw began in the late 18th or early 19th century as the art of carving whale bone and ivory aboard whale ships. The crew on whalers had plenty of leisure time between sighting and chasing whales, and the hard parts of whales were readily available on voyages that could last up to four years.

In its simplest form, a tooth was removed from the lower jaw of a sperm whale and the surface was prepared by scraping and sanding until it was smooth. The easiest way to begin an etching was to smooth a print over the tooth, prick the outline of the image with a needle and then “connect-the-dots” once the paper was removed. This allowed even unskilled craftsmen to create fine carvings. Some sailors were skilled enough to etch their drawings freehand. After the lines were finished, they were filled in with lamp black or sometimes colored pigments.

Scrimshaw could be decorative, like simple sperm whale teeth, or they could be useful, as in ivory napkin rings, corset busks (stiffeners), swifts for winding yarn or pie crimpers. The sailor’s hand-carved scrimshaw was then given to loved ones back on shore as souvenirs of the hard and lonely life aboard long and dangerous voyages.

Carved from the teeth of captured sperm whales, whale stamps were used to record the type of whale and number of barrels of oil they yielded.

The stamps were inked onto the page of whaleship logbooks or sailors’ journals, with an empty space in the whale’s body for writing in the number of barrels. This example in the form of a sperm whale is decorated with steel pin heads and a turned handle.

Part of the navigator’s tool kit, parallel rules were used to transfer compass points, course lines and other directional information across large charts without change. This large wooden set has a carved ivory whale inlaid into its surface, with a brass tack for the whale’s eye.

This panbone, or section of the back of a sperm whale’s jaw, served as the canvas for a whaleman’s freehand drawing of a busy whale hunt off the coast of the volcanic island of Ternate, one of the Spice Islands in Indonesia and the world’s main source of cloves until the 18th century.

In the lower left, a woman reaches out for her whaleman, who symbolically stands across the sea with one hand over his heart and a harpoon in the other. In her background is a tranquil domestic scene, probably their home. In the center, a fenced precinct labels the main scene. Above, on the right are the named whalers Margaret of London and Sophia of Nantucket. The remainder of the lively scene portrays seven whaleboats chasing a pod of six whales.

The artist has managed to convey loneliness between loved ones, great distance from home, an exotic and remote tropical locale, and a busy whale hunt on a single stretch of whalebone.

This large panbone, or section of the back of a sperm whale’s jaw, served as the canvas for a whaleman’s freehand drawing on two levels. In the center of the upper level is a three-masted whaleship with painted gun ports along its sides. Merchant vessels often did this, to look like powerful warships from a distance and thus protect themselves from pirates or other predators. The ship’s vertical whaleboat davits are empty, and the ship is sailing towards its little fleet of four whaleboats in various stages of harpooning a pod of five whales. Four of the whales are ‘blowing,’ or exhaling through the blowholes on top of their heads. One of the whales already has two harpoons sticking out of its back and is towing a whaleboat on a ‘Nantucket sleigh ride.' Behind the ship on the left is an old-fashioned two-masted topsail schooner sailing in the opposite direction. The sea in the foreground is calm, and the scene is placed against a shoreline of low, rolling hills. Below is another pair of sailing ships: a two-masted square-rigged brig follows a brigantine with a square-rigged foremast and a fore-and-aft main. Although engraved by the same very talented artist, the two levels of illustrations do not appear to be related. Judging from the extremely detailed and technical rigs and sails of all the ships, the scrimshaw artist may have been a sailmaker or rigger.

Scrimshaw began in the late 18th or early 19th century as the art of carving whale bone and ivory aboard whale ships. The crew on whalers had plenty of leisure time between sighting and chasing whales, and the hard parts of whales were readily available on voyages that could last up to four years.

In its simplest form, a tooth was removed from the lower jaw of a sperm whale and the surface was prepared by scraping and sanding until it was smooth. The easiest way to begin an etching was to smooth a print over the tooth, prick the outline of the image with a needle and then “connect-the-dots” once the paper was removed. This allowed even unskilled craftsmen to create fine carvings. Some sailors were skilled enough to etch their drawings freehand. After the lines were finished, they were filled in with lamp black or sometimes colored pigments.

Scrimshaw could be decorative, like simple sperm whale teeth, or they could be useful, as in ivory napkin rings, corset busks (stiffeners), swifts for winding yarn or pie crimpers. The sailor’s hand-carved scrimshaw was then given to loved ones back on shore as souvenirs of the hard and lonely life aboard long and dangerous voyages.

The wooden screw sloop of war USS Alaska was built in 1868 and spent much of her career in the southern Pacific and Far East representing the American nation in foreign ports. In June 1878, she cleared New York for San Francisco and stopped at several South American ports on the way.

One of Alaska's port calls from 20-29 September 1878 was to Talcahuano, in the center of Chile's coast and that nation's main naval port. It also was one the principal stops for American whalers in the Pacific seeking fresh supplies and entertainment. This massive sperm whale's tooth was probably purchased there and engraved by one of Alaska's crew to commemorate his visit. While the carver of this tooth is unknown, it may have been one of the officers who kept the official ship's logbooks, because the calligraphy on the covers of the logs for this voyage is exceptionally elaborate and colorful.

As this tooth indicates, the Talcahuano visit and liberty calls were memorable. Sent ashore on liberty, 54 of Alaska's crew went AWOL (Absent WithOut Leave), and three more were confined to double irons (feet and hand cuffs) for drunk and boisterous behavior or fighting.

For much of the nineteenth century, ladies' fashion required very small waists. The most common way to achieve this was to wear a tight laced corset, which could be adjusted according to the specific garment it accompanied. Like this example, many of them were handmade to fit an individual, although they were also available in shops.

One of the most intimate pieces of scrimshaw a whaleman could produce was a bone or baleen busk, or corset stiffener. These were carved and given to a crewman's loved one, who then inserted it into a matching sleeve on her corset as a unique memento of her beloved's feelings.

One side of this whalebone busk contains three cityscapes, two of which have busy ports with lots of shipping. The other side has eight vertical pictures, topped by a full frontal portrait of a beautiful young woman. She may represent the recipient of this busk. Below her is a city scene with multiple church steeples over a flag in a precinct. A multi-colored circular geometric pattern is at the center, above a garden scene over a delicate basket of flowers. Next is a three-masted warship, and at the bottom is a large rural villa overlooking a walled garden. Can these pictures be woven into a story?